Personas revisited: Extending the Use of Personas to Enhance Participatory Design

Abstract

Personas are a well-established tool in interactive system development, largely used with designers and developers. They can also be included in work with potential and actual users, particularly in eliciting user needs and concerns. We present three case studies in which personas are part of the research with potential users of interactive systems. Blind participants in research on assistive technologies often spontaneously generated personas who would benefit more from the technology than they themselves would. This was a way of being able to discuss potential needs and concerns, without admitting to having them oneself. Older participants exploring the potential of indoor drones generated personas who were older than themselves and would need the system more. Finally, personas were created to aid discussions with forestry workers about fatigue and safety issues that they might not want to admit to having themselves. From these case studies we draw recommendations for how personas can be deployed in working with potential and actual users of interactive systems in a variety of ways. CCS CONCEPTS • Human computer interaction (HCI); • HCI design and evaluation methods; • User models; • Interaction design; • Interaction design process and methods; • User centered design.;

Appropriation of adaptive literacy games into the German elementary school classroom

“…After defining and validating the resulting code set and using these to obtain clusters of population segments, the goal of this section is to describe the resulting personas in terms of the code set. A persona, in user-centred design, represents a user type and is useful in considering the goals, desires and limitations of a group of people (Bowen et al, 2020). It is Brennan and Prediger (1981) therefore possible to show the evolution of a teacher's perspectives, based on their persona categorisation in each interview.…”

Increasing independence for older adults who need technology support

“…This discussion started off with 15 minutes allocated to being asked questions about a persona and then 15 minutes being asked questions about personal usage. A persona was used during this first section in order to facilitate discussion about technology difficulties as the older adults may be hesitant to admit to these being problematic for themselves or to open up about their own difficulties straight away, as such using a persona that they could relate to or talk about as a real person or "friend" could allow for a more comfortable, open and honest conversation straight away and increase reliability in responses (Bowen et al, 2020). The persona created for use in these groups was a 78-year-old women called Jane who has very little technology experience and is hesitant to allow her grandkids to buy her an iPad.…”

O uso de personas no design de Tecnologias Assistivas para pessoas com deficiência visual

“…Personas são tipicamente introduzidas nas primeiras etapas no processo de design (BOWEN et al, 2020). O processo de criação de personas consiste na coleta e análise de dados de usuários, potenciais ou reais.…”

“…Trata-se de uma abordagem que tem como objetivo incluir o usuário no processo de design, visando compreender a sua experiência com o produto, ao analisar as suas características, as tarefas realizadas e o ambiente em que a interação ocorre (MIASKIEWICZ e KOZAR, 2011). Essa abordagem visa, sobretudo, garantir que as necessidades, objetivos e opiniões do usuário sejam compreendidas e incorporadas pela equipe de desenvolvimento, fazendo com que os usuários tenham uma contribuição significativa no produto final (BOWEN et al, 2020).…”

“…Existem diversas ferramentas que podem ser utilizadas no processo de design centrado no usuário. Entre elas, destaca-se a persona, ferramenta amplamente utilizada entre designers e desenvolvedores em times interdisciplinares (BOWEN et al, 2020). A persona é definida como uma representação fictícia de um grupo de usuários com características e necessidades similares (COOPER, 1999).…”